fgets()

Read a string of characters from a stream

Synopsis:

#include <stdio.h>

char* fgets( char* buf, 
             size_t n, 
             FILE* fp );

Library:

libc

Description:

The fgets() function reads a string of characters from the stream specified by fp, and stores them in the array specified by buf.

It stops reading characters when:

• the end-of-file is reached

  Or:

• a newline ('\n') character is read

  Or:

• n-1 characters have been read.

The newline character isn't discarded. A null character is placed immediately after the last character read into the array.

Don't assume the presence of a newline character in every string that is read with fgets(). A newline character isn't be present when more than n-1 characters occur before the newline. Also, a newline character might not appear as the last character in a file when the end-of-file is reached.

Returns:

The same pointer as buf for success, or NULL if the stream is at the end-of-file or an error occurs (errno is set).

Examples:

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

int main( void )
{
    FILE *fp;
    char buffer[80];

    fp = fopen( "file", "r" );
    if( fp != NULL ) {
        while( fgets( buffer, 80, fp ) != NULL ) {
            fputs( buffer, stdout );
        }
        fclose( fp );
        
        return EXIT_SUCCESS;
    }
    
    return EXIT_FAILURE;
}

Classification:

ANSI

See also:

errno, fopen(), getc(), gets(), fgetc()